Summer spectacular

Jagged rock-islands as far as the eye can see.

The Shakotan Peninsula’s Cape Kamui eases its way out into the Japan Sea like a advancing dinosaur, the howling wind whipping up waves which engulf the rocks at its feet. On its brow sits a lighthouse steering the seafarer clear of danger. Kamui is one of Shakotan’s three capes: the others being Ogon and the eponymous Cape Shakotan. The peninsula is renowned for its desolate sheer cliffs, plummeting into the boisterous ocean, crystal-clear waters and numerous needle-point rocky island outcrops just offshore, the product of millions of years of wear and tear from buffeting and pounding swells eating away at the coastline. Over the horizon lie Russia, and further to the south, North Korea.

Shakotan’s Cape Kamui eases into the Japan Sea like a giant dinosaur. 

Enjoy the spectacular views! 

The name Shakotan originates from two words from the Indigenous Ainu languages, shak, meaning “summer”, and kotan meaning “village”.  Its genesis as a region came through the development of the rich herring industry in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Herrings became such a money spinner that the nearby town of Otaru, “herring central” in its heyday, became so wealthy from the trade, and such a centre of commerce, it became know as the Wall Street of Japan’s North. Overfishing and climate change killed off these marine versions of the goose laying golden eggs around the mid-195os leaving the townships struggling to find new meaning in life.

The stunning Shakotan coastline.

Tourism is stepping into the breech with the sea again offering a lifeline. Shakotan is renowned for its uni and ikura, the much-sought-after bowls of ikuradon and unidon a major drawcard in summer and autumn. Tourists who travel to enjoy the old herring warehouses and canals of Otaru are happy to travel the few extra kilometres to savour a bowl plus the spectacular scenery en route. Along the stunning coastline a scenic, 42-km highway snakes along open stretches and through tunnels around the numerous bays and inlets. Dramatic cliffs drop into the ocean with townships, mostly deserted, scattered along the length. The Peninsula is also a stopping off point for Japan’s only national marine sanctuary. A growing attraction is glass-bottom boat excursions into the Japan Sea.  It’s all giving a new lease of life for the “summer village”.

Anyone for ikuradon? Unidon? 

Winding roads and tunnels. 

Lonely Shakotan shacks.

Thanks to Yogi for some of the photographs.

 

 

Kawaii…..

The word kawaii, exclaimed with squeals of delight, is ubiquitous in Japan. It means “cute”, or “adorable”, a quality highly rated by Japanese females, especially young women. The use of kawaii goes into overdrive around most of the country on 15 November each year, the designated day of the Shichi-Go-San Matsuri – the Seven-Five-Three Festival – when the year’s batch of littl’uns turning 7, 5 and 3 dress in their sumptuous national costume, have their photographs formally taken, then head off to the local shrine with proud families for even more photographs, and blessings.

With two grandchildren in those age ranges I was delighted to be personally involved in the most recent Shichi-Go-San in Hokkaido. There, in northern Japan, it’s held a month earlier so the children aren’t subject to the rigours of biting early winter winds and temperatures that can bring snow falls from late October onwards. On the big day, first there’s the trip to the professional photographic studio where formal shots are taken in full kimono, luckily available for rent given the the cost involved in a complete outfit. An astonishing array of colourful gear is jammed into laden racks around the studio awaiting selection.  There are the so many layers that make up the completed attire – inner garments,  outer jackets, sashes for both boys and girls, zori sandals, trinkets for specially coiffed hair,  oversize bows for the backs of kimono, little handbags and props such as “samurai swords” for the boys. After the lengthy photo session, with well skilled photographers (mostly girls!) managing fidgety children with amazing humour, comes the selection of images, a tricky decision indeed. 

 

Then off to the shrine for more photos -and given the intricacy, elegance, colourfulness  and sheer charm of their ensembles the children are naturally greeted with many more squeals of kawaii!

A roe by any other name

The freshest ikura and kani don at a seaside restaurant on the Shakotan Peninsula. 

The etymology of words is fascinating.  And so it is with that sought-after Japanese autumn delicacy, ikura, – いくら – the glistening omega3-packed sacs of exquisate piquancy that explode with surprise and flavour on the taste buds. Otherwise known as “red caviar” the Japanese word for the salmon roe sounds a natural part of the language. But in reality it’s borrowed from the Russian for “caviar” – ikra – and directly transposed into the Japanese into which it readily fits. A clue that it’s not a Japanese word is that it is written in a phonetic script, rather than kanji Chinese characters. A little research also reveals that in the Turkish word for caviar is kuru, very similar to ikra and ikura.

Delicacy double dipping – ikura and uni don. 

Each year the salmon river migration takes place in late summer/early autumn in Hokkaido. Luckily for the salmon using every ounce of their strength to get back home, once they enter the rivers and streams they are protected, except for recreational fishermen who apply for a special licence ahead of time. But that it doesn’t count Hokkaido brown bears and eagles. After spawning, the exhausted salmon depart to fish heaven.

The most delicious ikura is said to come from  roe taken just before the breeding season when the outer film is taut and the roe soft.  The thin membrane that holds the roe in a cluster needs to be carefully removed to separate the individual eggs. They are then marinated before being eagerly devoured, usually with steamed rice. My daughter-in-law’s mother marinates her ikura in a 60/30/10 mixture of soy sauce, sake and mirin.

Separating the roe from its membrane sac; marinating ikura; ready to eat!  

A popular dish in Japan is ikuradon – a bowl of rice topped by glistening, deep red roe. Often it is teamed with other treats such as uni – sea urchin – and kani – crab. Sea urchin is a prized luxury in Japan, especially when it’s in season in summer. My son is a great fan and would weep to hear of seaweed farmers in Tasmania destroying sea urchins with some sort of robotic spear because they are a major predator of their “crops”. There must be an export opportunity there!

Packaged ikura tops Hokkaido souvenirs at New Chitose Airport’s amazing retail mall.

 

Happy New Year – 明けましておめでとうございます

Nengajou welcome the New Year for multiple millions of Japanese.

Happy New Year! As millions of lunar calendar followers around the world welcome in the 2017 New year, those following the Oriental calendar are preparing to wave goodbye to that little scallywag the monkey and welcome in the stately rooster.

In Japan, where Oriental symbolism is synced with the lunar calendar the Rooster has crowed his first 2017 morning call. Multiple millions of nengajou, the little symbol cards that friends and family send each other, rather like Christmas cards, are arriving in special postal deliveries through the day. Across the world revellers are waking to sore heads, or the first day of well intentioned resolutions. The rooster will be in hot demand this year, this famous early morning riser credited with being able to foretell the future. Many will hope that he can see an end to the political upheavals experienced in numerous countries in 2016.

2016 calendars will come down and their replacements will go up. I have written before about the attachments I form to my calendars, which usually include one put together by my photographically talented older brother; another which I order specially from Tokyo’s captivating Blue and White Shop in Azabu Juban; and one which arrives every year from a young Japanese woman who stayed with us as an international language student over 20 years ago.

Hello new Blue and White, goodbye old; and a sad farewell to this Southern NSW egret image. 

This year I’ll be putting up a beautiful calendar featuring Japanese art treasures, given to me by my Japanese family, which has been published by JAL Airlines for as long as I can remember. The pieces chosen for each month are exquisite, of the quality of treasures I’ve seen in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Oriental section. While a calendar’s not quite as good as the real thing it’s an excellent substitute.

A section from the January illustration from the JAL calendar. 

Whether you’re an Oriental or a lunar cycle person here’s wishing you a very happy 2017 . May the qualities of warmth, generosity, diligence, sociability and excellent communication skills attributed to the rooster be the overriding zeitgeist in 2017.

Four seasons in three weeks

Cows graze in bucolic bliss beneath Mt Yotei. 

Fields lie fallow awaiting winter snows.

Autumn is my favourite travel month. You can’t beat it for cost, crowd and climate reasons. It’s the perfect time to enjoy comfortable temperatures in most countries, without peak season crowds, and travel and accommodation prices. The added bonus in cold climate countries is the spectacle of autumn colours. I’ve not long returned from (what is becoming) my annual sojourn in Hokkaido which happily coincided with the late autumn. And the season didn’t disappoint. Japan’s northernmost island, famed for its incomparable powder snow, managed to give a taste of all seasons during my three-week visit, an opportunity to enjoy what lies beneath the ubiquitous white of winter.

When I arrived in early October the weather was warm, the autumn colours just starting to show. The tip of Mt Yotei’s distinctive volcanic cone had a dusting of white but cows still grazed in bucolic bliss on lush green pastures close by. My first weekend the thermometer sat at about 23 C, ideal for picking grapes destined for crushing for Niseko’s fledgling sparkling wine industry. Sun block and hats were a must.

Harvesting grapes for Niseko’s fledgling sparkling wine industry. 

By early the next week a trough came through dropping the temperature and hastening the spread of the autumn colours. Soon the surrounding countryside was ablaze, the famous momiji  transforming to their signature shade of crimson – the turning “to flame” that Australian poet Clive James wrote in Japanese Maple. I love the way the Japanese kanji for autumn, aki, is a combination of the tree and fire symbols -秋.

The rice harvest is completed as autumn sets in.

A momoji turns to flame. 

Autumnal landscape. 

 

A happy conjunction of autumn and Hallowe’en. 

The ojizosama watches over passersby. 

By late the next week the temperature had dropped further, rain turned to sleet, and by the timeof my departure the landscape had put on its familiar white winter coat. A perfect sayonara.

Sayonara snowfall.

 

Avid readers

A favourite haunt back in the ’90s when we lived in inner-city Brisbane was the original Mary Ryan Bookshop in Latrobe Terrace. Apart from its laden shelves there was a welcoming coffee shop on the lower level where I would take my mother for our fix of caffeine and to enjoy its treed garden sloping down one of Paddington’s many gullies. Mary Ryan was one of the first bookshops to incorporate a coffee shop and the genial owner Phil Ryan a pleasant and knowledgable source of advice on what to buy.

Alas, Mary Ryan Paddington was one of many such book-lover-friendly enterprises that succumbed to the competitive forces unleashed by  the internet in the 2000s. Those that have survived are much treasured. In Brisbane the best known of these are Riverbend Books in Bulimba and Avid Reader in West End. As a end-of-year treat my bookclub facilitator had the prescience to reserve a spot with the latter’s knowledgable owner Fiona Stager, a much-sought-after presence at such talks because of her wealth of knowledge of the latest publications and her well regarded opinions.  Apart from her status as an avid and discerning reader Fiona has a wealth of knowledge of the publishing industry as a lecturer on the subject at the University of Queensland.

Over glasses of wine and tempting snacks she talked through her reading suggestions from the latest publishers’ offerings. Interestingly a number were by Australian writers, underscoring the health of our literary scene.  Her recommendations:

Not Just Black and White, by Lesley and Tammy Williams, which tells Lesley’s story of being an Aboriginal girl from Cherbourg settlement forced from home to work as a domestic servant; Ghost Empire, beloved ABC Conversations host Richard Fidler’s rich telling of the history of old Constantinople; The Riviera Set,  the rollicking bed-hopping and partying history of the monied and famous at the Chateau de l’Horizon near Cannes over a period of 40 years; The Atomic Weight of Love, Elizabeth J Church’s story of an ornithologist who marries a much older physics professor recruited to work on the Los Alamos Project and her battle to retain her own academic identify; The Birdman’s Wife in which Melissa Ashley gives artist Elizabeth Gould the credit she deserves as the true genius behind John Gould’s famous early sketches of Australia’s unique bird life; To the Bright Edge of the World, an Alaskan explorer’s story extracted by Eowyn Ivey from journal entries, military reports, letters and documents; Our Souls at Night, a tender account by Kent Haruf of a widow who asks her widower neighbour if he’d consider sharing her bed – not for sex but for warmth and comfort; My Name is Lucy Barton, Elizabeth Stroud’s telling of a hospital-bedside reconciliation between a long-estranged mother and daughter;  Between a Wolf and a Dog, the heartfelt account by Georgia Blain, daughter of acclaimed journalist Anne Deveson and broadcaster Ellis Blain, of a woman dying from a brain tumour, and written at a time when Blain herself was diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer; Truly, Madly, Guilty, world top-seller Australian Liane Moriarty’s latest pot boiler and suggested by Fiona as the perfect beach holiday read; One, Patrick Holland’s well researched account of the demise of Australia’s last bushrangers, the Kenniffs, in western Queensland;  in Tell the Truth, Shame the Devil, popular writer of young  adult novels, Melina Marchetta, makes a provocative move to crime fiction to reviewer approval; Midsomer Murders screenwriter Anthony Horowitz has fun with the vintage crime novel genre in Magpie Murders;  nature writer Simon Barnes tells how birds help us understand the world we live in, in The Meaning of Birds; and finally,The Memory Stones, Caroline Brothers’ harrowing account of the Disappeared of Argentina’s  military coup in 1976 and the ongoing devastation down the generations.

Splendid isolation

Blowing an Atlantic gale in Baracoa. That’s the airstrip just short of the water! 

The current selection of my book club, The Distant Marvels by Cuban-American writer Chantel Acevedo, centres on the town of Maisi on the hurricane-prone Atlantic Coast in Guantanamo Province, near where our Cuba odyssey finished in Baracoa. The book tells the story of an elderly evacuee from the deadly 1963 Hurricane Flora, Maria Sirena, a former lectora or professional story-teller, who entertains fellow evacuees by recounting her colourful life as the daughter of revolutionaries fighting in the Spanish-Cuban War of Independence. By coincidence, as I turned the novel’s  pages, the scenes brought alive by my familiarity with the setting, Hurricane Matthew was roaring towards that very coastline, crossing around Baracoa.

“The most beautiful land that human eyes could set upon”.

The day we arrived in Baracoa an Atlantic gale was blowing too, the winds whipping up the darkened waves with wild white crests and bending the copious palm trees. By the next day the weather had settled, returning the town to what Christopher Columbus described as “the most beautiful land that human eyes could set upon”. Baracoa was where Columbus first set foot on Cuban soil in 1492. The conquistador, Diego Velazquez, established a settlement in 1511 which became the fledgling colony’s first capital. Baracoa retained this status until the crown was taken by Santiago de Cuba, its isolation because of the high Sierra del Purial mountains making it accessible only by sea until the 1960s when the first paved road between the town and Guantanamo went through. Columbus is said to have planted a cross, the Cruz de la Parra, in the sands of Baracoa Beach, the sacred relic now safely behind a protective grill in the local Cathdral de Nuestra Senora de la Asuncion.

The Cruz de la Parra planted by Christopher Columbus in the sands of Baracoa beach. 

At the time of settlement the area was populated by the Taino people, but European diseases played havoc as they did with the indigenous people in other Spanish colonies. Taking price of place in the town square is a statue of the local Taino hero Hatuey who raised an army to fight the Spanish. He was captured and sentenced to death by burning at the stake. Legend has it that, asked if he wished to convert to Catholicism to ensure his passage to Heaven, he replied that if Spaniards were in Heaven he would rather go to Hell. Remnants of Taino culture can be observed at the local Archeological Musuem in a cave behind the town. Glass-enclosed exhibits, indigenous jewelry, ceramics, sculptures and skeletons are on display.

Taino Archeological Museum and exhibits. 

Baracoa’s abundant climate and setting have endowed it with plentiful food resources. Tropical fruits, coffee and cocoa flourish while absolutely fresh seafood graces restaurant tables. Laden almond trees grow wild in the forests and on an island in the middle of a river our helpful boatman found fat specimens and cracked them fresh for us. A combination of necessity, isolation and the verdant climate has resulted in Baracoa developing a reputation as a centre for alternative medicines.

Baracoa treat…almonds fresh from the tree. 

We were due to leave the splendid isolation of Baracoa by aircraft for the one-and-a-half hour flight back to Havana. But hearing that the plane was waiting for a few replacement parts, and having viewed the runway of the local airport, which ends abruptly before it pitches into the Atlantic, we didn’t complain when we had to take a four-hour bus ride across pot-holed dirt roads to get to the airport at less remote Holguin.

Soul city

The 1520 Catedral de Nuestra de Senora overlooks  Parque Cespedes and Santiago Harbour.

If Havana is the heart of Cuba, Santiago is its soul. The city was founded in 1515 by the Spanish Conquistador Diego Velazquez and for over 100 years was an early capital of Cuba. One of its first mayors was another conquistador, Hernan Cortez, who was later to claim Mexico for the Spanish.

Culturally Santiago is regarded as the birthplace of Cuba’s signature Son musical genre, best recognised through Buena Vista Social Club’s sound, an irrepressible mix of Latin and African rhythms and harmonies with other influences thrown in. Santiago’s cultural melting pot persona was enriched by its proximity to Cribbean islands Jamaica and Haiti from where both English and French speaking slaves were brought to replace dwindling indigenous workers in local plantations and mines. Today the city retains pride in its cultural roots with a strong representation of museums, clubs and cultural associations and world-famous institutions such as the Afro-Cuban dance company Ballet Folklorico Tucumba. One of the best-preserved Spanish fortresses of the 17th century sits atop a cliff face at the entrance to Santiago Bay reminding visitors of Spain’s early and many tussles with pirates.

The centre of Santiago de Cuba. 

Santiago is known as the Hero City of the Republic as the incubator of the Cuban Revolution. It was from the Moncada Barracks in 1953 that Fidel Castro first struck out against President Batista in an abortive attempt to overthrow the dictator, its mustard-coloured walls still bearing the bullet holes of the uprising.  It was during his trial for the insurrection that Castro made his famous “History Will Absolve Me” speech. Castro was imprisoned following his trial but later exiled to Mexico.

(Top) Moncado Barracks still bears its insurrection scars; (above) Castro announced the success of his revolution from this balcony. 

It was Santiago’s citizens who were the first to rise up against Government troops in 1956, the start of the revolution that would ultimately topple Batista. With the Revolution finally succeeding in 1959 Castro chose a hotel overlooking Santiago’s main square Parque Cespedes to announce the victory.

World Heritage-listed Castillo de San Pedro del Morro at the entrance to the Bay of Santiago. 

Another landmark Santiago attraction is the Cementerio Santa Ifigenia, the final resting place of many of Cuba’s historical figures and heros including Jose Marti. Built in 1868 for the victims of the War of Independence against Spain, and the yellow fever epidemic, its 8000 internees include Emilio Bacardí of rum dynasty fame; “martyrs” of the Moncada Barracks attack; the “father of Cuban independence”, Carlos Manuel de Céspedes (1819–74); and internationally famous  Buena Vista Social Club member Compay Segundo. Marti’s final resting place is an impressive mausoleum where each half-hour every day a round-the-clock guard is changed with great ceremony. We were told that Santa Ifigenia will be the final resting place of Fidel Castro when the time comes.

The entrance to Cementerio Santa Ifigenia.

(Top) Jose Marti’s mausoleum; (above) changing of the guard. 

(Top) Buena Vista Social Club’s Compay Segundo’s grave; (above) Emilio Bacardi’s resting place. 

 

Coffee break

Historic cobble-stoned streets in colourful Trinidad de Cuba. 

Trinidad de Cuba nestles under the Escambray Mountains on the Mediterranean coast of central Cuba. Surrounded by lush plantations growing sugar, tobacco and coffee Trinidad, which dates back to 1514, and its famous Valle de los Ingenios (Valley of the Sugar Mills) were World Heritage listed in 1988. The cobbled-stone streets, colourful original buildings and white, palm-fringed sandy beaches of Trinidad make it a favourite with tourists.

The famous watch tower in Valle de los Ingenios (Valley of the Sugar Mills). 

Looking out over the plantations. 

Travellers can enjoy a variety of activities in the city like learning to salsa, or Cuban drumming, swimming under waterfalls or horse riding through the plantations. Our choice of the latter had a serendipitous outcome – notwithstanding having to contend with a single-minded steed with a penchant for prickly bushes: our ride culminated in one of the best and most unconventional cups of coffee I have ever enjoyed.

My single-minded steed.

Deep in the valley at a simple thatch-roofed and rude timber lean-to a local plantation owner played host to caffeine-deprived visitors with the freshest of drops, grinding anew for each guest fresh beans to the sounds of an African plantation workers’ song that had been passed down through the decades. The grounds were then added to water boiling on a simple flame and brewed to perfection for serving to the waiting guests. Delicioso!

Grinding to the beat.

Brewing time. 

The best cup of coffee ever! 

 

 

 

Nothing to sing about

Back in the sixties the song Guantanamera was the anthem of the folk music movement. The song was about about a young woman from the province of Guantanamo in Cuba  based on a poem by Cuba’s national hero, the poet Jose Marti. It was a far cry from the image conjured today by the name Guantanamo,  one inextricably entwined with orange prison jump suits and America’s relentlessness punishment of  those deemed responsible for the 11 September attacks on the World Trade Centre in 2001.

Despite ongoing attempts by Cuba to reclaim the remote outpost on its south-eastern tip, especially since the recent restoration of diplomatic relations, The United States has steadfastly clung to the territory since it established a naval base there in 1898 at the end of the Spanish-American war. In 1903 the US signed a lease for the land with Cuba which was renewed, in perpetuity, in 1934 for an additional, but still minuscule, rent.  Efforts to reclaim the territory stepped up after the 1959 revolution.

Guantanamo lookout spot. 

Guantanamo Bay’s large harbour and topography, surrounded by steep hills which isolate it from the adjacent hinterland, make it particularly valuable as an isolated outpost than remains in US hands but outside US law. We passed within view of the facility on our way from Santiago de Cuba to Baracoa down on the Atlantic Ocean coast near where it adjoins the Caribbean. A lookout spot built on a hill above the bay allows a distant but good view of the isolated outpost, a lonely spot indeed.

(Top) Distant white buildings of the facility; (bottom) the base’s topography ensures isolation. 

The song enjoys a happier history than the base. US group The Sandpipers scored an international hit with their version of The Weavers’ arrangement recorded at a concert at Carnegie Hall in 1963. Many other top artists worldwide have recorded it including folk hero Pete Seeger, Julio Inglesias, Joan Baez, Jose Feliciano, Nana Mouskouri, the Gypsy Kings and, of course, the Buena Vista Social Club. And no matter where you go in Cuba you are guaranteed to hear the strains of Guantanamera floating in the air.